Am I the only one who recognizes that yards rarely match homes? This may be fine as a home owner, but as a home seller this creates a negative first impression in a buyer's mind.
I must confess that I have been the biggest offender of the "Yard Doesn't Match The Home" group. It was a long standing joke in my family that my house was the Plant Cemetary - in other words, plants went to my house to die - so I have complete empathy for others lacking a green thumb, talent or time to devote to their yards. In fact, when I sold my previous two homes I didn't care that my yards were sadly lacking. As far as I was concerned, if the new buyer had a green thumb, they could deal with it!
It wasn't until my husband and I purchased our most recent home that I started my Curb Appeal education. Although the home is great, the yard didn't even meet my negligible standards and certainly didn't meet the standards of the neighborhood. So what is a girl with no time, no talent and no green thumb to do? Find the perfect Landscape Design Consultant!
If you are like me and live in Contra Costa or Alameda counties in East Bay, California, Ceclia Pleshakov of CP Gardens will save the day! Cecilia offers a range of services from Consulting (you pay her hourly consulting rate and she will tell you every plant you need to buy and where you need to plant them) to a full-fledged Landscape Design that will be accomplished without you lifting a finger.
While it is common practice to spend thousands of dollars staging the interior of a home for sale, the additional money spent for Landscape Consulting - combined with a trip to the Nursery and an afternoon spent digging in the dirt - will result in Curb Appeal that draws buyers in and sets a positive expectation for the home. Plant's aren't expensive and the advice of an expert will make every dime an investment that will reap dividends!
But beware, Cecilia is a great teacher as well as a Landscape Consultant. My home is no longer the Plant Cemetary and I spend hours every weekend happily digging around my dirt (I have even learned that worms are darn important).
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